When they stepped onto the teleportation circle, Gene’s vision was filled with a blinding white. Snow blanketed the lands around Tzardiche Keep, obscuring the arrival of the adventurers from the viewpoint of the Spire.

  Derek stepped ahead of the others. He was clad in birch armor and in his homeland, his skin shifted to camouflage with his surroundings, making him hard to see in the squall. He turned to face the adventurers and smiled.

  “Now, my valiant warriors, the plan is simple. We charge the gates and rush to the war room for their communication crystals.”

  Gene’s mind went blank. In fact, all of Silvayn froze and stopped thinking when Derek laid out what he qualified as a plan. It took him a moment to snap back to attention and he reached out with his thoughts.

  “Kyra, now,” he projected to her and the young Cleric raised a glowing hand.

  “Oooo,” said Kyra in a singsong voice. “I’ve just received a divine boon from–”

  She hesitated. This was not only blasphemous but also ridiculous. She couldn’t believe anyone would believe this story they hastily created. Thankfully for her, Winnie spoke up.

  “From the goddess Aliyah?! Oh wow, that’s amazing!”

  She nudged her, prompting her to continue and the Cleric sighed.

  “Yes. A boon,” she said through gritted teeth. “I can use this power to hide your approach and infiltration of the tower. But I will need a guard to watch me while I maintain this power.”

  Someone in the crowd started to speak up before Gene’s hand shot up in the air and he yelled, “I can do it! I mean, I think it’s best I stay. Since my circlet’s still busted, I’m not as powerful as I was last time. I think I’d get in the way of you real combatants.”

  Derek eyed him suspiciously for a few seconds before sneering and saying, “Mmm, yes, well let us take advantage of this moment. Even the goddess sheds her light on our conquest! We’ll go in and clear the floors from top to bottom so they can’t set off their alarms. Let us go and retake my land!”

  Derek and the adventurers yelled in unison and Silvayn joined in a moment later before they departed.

  “Just be sure to stay clustered together for the spell to work!” yelled Gene.

  The moment they left his sight, Gene expanded his mind’s eye. With his upgraded senses, he saw everything in a vast location but his attention was focused on the group. He reached deep into his mental resources and the sights, scents, and sounds around the group warped around them.

  “Keep them focused on the approach,” thought Gene to Kyrie.

  When they approached the Forsaken, some of the adventurers shook with nerves but Kyrie reached out to still them. Not a single creature noticed the large group on the move. Gene concentrated hard, generating an illusory field around everyone. He drew in their thoughts, filtered out the appearances of the adventurers, and redirected anything that would give them away.

  When it was clear there was no danger, Derek strode ahead of the group, leading the charge to enter the tower. Kyra stood at Gene’s side, a ball of nerves and apprehension. She hadn’t fully shed her fear of what he was or could become but their time together in Taos had made her look at him in a different light. He wasn’t a monster, he was an unknown to the world and to her it seemed his system made him into much more of a pawn in New Venturis. She had to help him preserve his humanity.

  “So far, so good,” he said to Kyra as he watched the group enter the tower.

  To their credit, Derek’s forces moved as one. They skillfully slipped into the tower to execute his portion of the plan, moving in concert to climb the spiral staircase. The members of Silvayn were relieved to find the layout of the Spire was nearly identical to one they destroyed. Within the walls, Kyrie relied on hand signals to guide Derek up to the top of the war room.

  “17th floor,” said Gene, watching their ascent. “Man, they’re moving fast.”

  Outside, he found himself stepping towards the Spire, stretching his mental illusion rapidly to keep up with the climbing adventurers and obscure any footprints left behind. He prayed the snow would fall faster to fill them so he could shift his focus forward to follow but he came to realize he was no cleric. Through his mental sense, he felt one of the Forsaken stepping towards the path laid out by the team and his stomach dropped.

  “Kyra, we’ve got trouble,” he said, straining to split his focus between the adventurers when they reached the 21st floor. Kyra saw sweat on his brow and knew he was pushing himself.

  She raised her staff and said, “I’m on it! Stay focused.”

  She cast Beacon of Observance, directing the origin point as far as she could away from the tower. Gene saw two of the Forsaken turn towards the point of her spell and start walking away from the footprints. One by one, they slowly departed as her spell took effect until half a dozen were on the move to her beacon.

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  “Kyra–”

  He started before she interjected, “Whatever you do, whatever happens, don’t drop your illusion.”

  She rushed off to the point and Gene called out. He couldn’t move for fear of the adventurers stepping out his range. He considered using a Power Stunt before he heard her thoughts.

  “Don’t worry about me. There’s nothing to fear. You haven’t seen me in action yet.”

  Kyra gave a devilish grin unbefitting of a cleric as she charged to her beacon. Her mind raced and her grin turned into a grimace.

  The daily allotment of prayers for a cleric of Kyra’s current level was 5. They were minor miracles you could call on your deity to perform. A cleric of Aliyah could ask for cleansing powerful status effects, curing grievous wounds, or most importantly for Kyra at that moment, unleashing a spark of the goddess’s undying flame to deliver a holy conflagration.

  “Gene, I need a countdown,” she thought as she ran, maintaining her spell. “How many seconds until they reach where I placed the beacon?”

  Kyra’s thoughts crashed into Gene’s mind with urgency but he held his focus in a vice grip. He could tell there was a desperation to her actions but rather than overextending himself, he chose to trust in her plans and began to count.

  “10, 9, 8,” his voice pinged into her mind like a radar she shuddered.

  “Time it right, Ky,” she said to herself as half a dozen creatures crunched snow underfoot. “Time it right!”

  Six Forsaken converged on her designated location and her prayer went out to the heavens. From above New Venturis, the goddess Aliyah tipped her torch in response, dropping a minuscule fraction of her undying flame onto the spot Kyra indicated.

  A column of fire plummeted from space, instantly incinerating 3 of the Forsaken, maiming two, and singing the last that was just out of the blast radius. She gripped her staff tight. It would have to do.

  Gene reached out to Kyrie in a panic, projecting his thoughts to the warrior.

  “Kyrie, we’ve got trouble. A few Forsaken noticed your footprints when they got out of my radius and Kyra moved to engage.”

  He didn’t respond right away. Gene sensed apprehension from Kyrie before he thought, “We’ve run into an obstacle of our own.”

  Sweat dripped from Kyrie’s face on the landing of the 29th floor. Everyone stood frozen in horror as they looked into the large room that opened to reveal a mess hall full of 10 duplicates of Melias.

  The duplicates were eating and conversing as if they were a small contingent of an army and not duplicates of the same person. Each of them had the number 10 emblazoned on their chests, indicating each of them possessed 10 percent of the power of the original, information that Kyrie’s father fought desperately to obtain. He panicked. Their plan to retrieve the crystal from the war room on the 30th floor would leave them open to a brutal pincer maneuver by the one man army.

  Could he handle 10 percent of Melias’s strength? He wasn’t confident at the thought, even less so when he was facing 10 of them. He knew it would be a brutal and desperate clash, but if they gave Winnie an opening, she could deliver an impactful spell to turn the tide of battle. He was thinking up plans of action when Derek started moving forward.

  He raised his spear and didn’t speak as he pushed past Kyrie, clearly planning to strike. Thankfully, Eonis’s hand shot out to stop him.

  “What in the 9 hells do you think you’re doing?” whispered Eonis.

  The fellow Wood Elf glared at him before responding. “Hmph, as if a mere 10 percent of Melias could slow me. I shall clear this space single-handedly and we will proceed with my plan!”

  The members of Silvayn were wide-eyed in disbelief. They knew he had an overinflated sense of his capabilities but this was beyond anything they ever expected. Their squabbling grew until the sound of footsteps from above commanded their attention.

  A single duplicate with the number 25 on his chest reached the landing and the sight of him extinguished the fires in Derek’s chest. Power radiated from the man, making Kyrie question just how powerful the real Melias was if only 25 percent of him was this beastly. He heard a clattering and turned to see it was Derek shaking uncontrollably.

  “Everybody, be calm,” whispered Kyrie. He lowered his voice reflexively in Melias’s presence.

  The duplicate entered the room and spoke loudly, silencing his weaker counterparts.

  “You four, rotate out with the war room staff. They need a break.”

  “Yes, sir,” said the duplicates in unison before hopping to attention and rushing out of the room.

  He watched them go before clapping and saying, “Let’s not forget, this is a sanctioned operation here from the Dark Lord. Losing that last tower has this one working overtime. We must maintain its operation and secure it from any siege attempts by those worms.”

  “Yes, sir!” the room exclaimed in unison and Melias turned to leave.

  Conversation resumed when he exited the room but to the collective horror of the adventurers, he paused on the landing and glanced in their direction.

  “Dispelling slash.”

  Melias’s hands flickered when he spoke and suddenly a slashing burst of energy exploded through the air just above their heads, opening a hole in the wall. When nothing happened and no one moved, Melias simply shrugged and continued his ascent. Fear rippled through the group.

  “Be calm!” exclaimed Kyrie, struggling to steady his own nerves. He couldn’t move, couldn’t turn his head to look, but behind him, he felt the rush of wind from the destroyed wall behind him.

  His palms grew sweaty under his gloves, but his hands weren’t the only ones to sweat. Near the back of the group, one of the Wizards brought by Derek was an emotional wreck. He saw death in Melias’s unfocused eyes and the magic orb in his hands was slick with sweat. When Melias turned to continue up the steps, the Wizard exhaled his fear but a sudden trembling took over his hands from the unwound nerves. Before he realized it, the orb in his hand slipped from his grip and clattered to the floor.

  The adventurers all turned at the sound that rang out as the orb bounced down the steps before the Wizard could grasp it with his magic. The room went quiet and the Melias ascending the steps paused. He glared down at the spot where the group stood and the sound of countless drawn blades filled the silence and chilled Kyrie to the bone.